News by Subject Chemistry & Physics

The process of building a tiny cube has revealed some of the fundamental mysteries of how molecules bind together in natural environments. Researchers hope to apply this knowledge to future projects designing complex structures that can mimic life.

Thrips don't rely on lift in order to fly. Instead, the tiny insects rely on a drag-based flight mechanism, staying afloat in airflow velocities with a large ratio of force to wing size. Researchers have performed the first test of drag force on a thrip's wing under constant airflow in a bench-top wind tunnel and, drawing from microfabrication and nanomechanics, they created an experiment in which a thrip's wing was glued to a self-sensing microcantilever.

Laboratory experiments and a parabolic flight campaign have enabled an international team of researchers from the Helmholtz-Zentrum Dresden-Rossendorf (HZDR) to gain new insights into water electrolysis, in which hydrogen is obtained from water by applying electric energy. Water electrolysis could play a key role in the energy transition if efficiency improvements can be achieved. The findings published recently in the journal Physical Review Letters offer a possible starting point for enhancing the environmental impact of hydrogen-based technologies.

Microplastics suspended in water can be gathered using acoustic forces in microchannels. The bulk acoustic wave (BAW) device can be customized to gather microplastic fibers and particles of different sizes. When run in series and parallels, the device can successfully concentrate free floating microplastics in large amounts of water into very manageable quantities. This is a promising new technique to clean our laundry grey water before they are released into the environment.

For the first time, researchers can track biological molecules with unprecedented speed and precision thanks to the use of multi-metallic nanoparticles. The researchers published their results on October 17 in ACS Photonics, a journal of the American Chemical Society.

Researchers at the Institute of Biotechnology, University of Helsinki, have uncovered multi-level relationships between locomotion - the ways animals move - and brain architecture, using high-definition 3D models of lizard and snake brains.

Researchers hope put to rest a century-old scientific debate by demonstrating that the low-level organism S. roeseli is capable of decision making. They also offer the video evidence to prove it.

Wake Forest Institute for Regenerative Medicine (WFIRM) scientists are the first to report using bioprinting to print a tracheal tissue construct comprising of multiple different functional materials. They printed different designs of smooth muscle and cartilage regions in artificial tracheal substitutes showing similar mechanical properties to human tracheal tissue.

VTT researchers were able to transmit light in wood-based fibre. Optical fibre made of cellulose is best suited for sensors that benefit from the biodegradability of the material. In the future, optical cellulose fibre may allow detecting changes in the moisture level of buildings.